Our Christmas trip to Nepal has become an annual scheduled event. The project is important because we make a visit to every sponsorship program to get progress reports and new photos of the children. It is a huge project because the Nepal ministry is huge. We have children sponsored in children's homes (which are not really orphanages). We have children, who live with their families, sponsored under churches. Some of the churches are quite a distance to travel. We need to take a 1 hour flight to reach the area of one of the programs. It takes about two weeks to visit them all. At each stop, we gather the children for the Christmas story. We distribute Christmas bags. We line the children up and take the photos--and each child must fill in the progress report that will be given to his sponsor. I talk with the leader of each ministry about any questions or problems he has had. We talk about children who are ready to "graduate" and finish our program and about new ones who need to come in. We take a team of women for this trip because we need many hands to complete all of the tasks. The Christmas bags are the first big task. By the time the team arrives in December, we have already gathered the items to make up the contents of the bags. I have carried the things to Nepal in previous trips throughout the year or they have been purchased in Nepal. Typical contents are toothbrush, Christmas craft, school supplies, candy. Some years they have received T-shirts, hats, shoes, Bibles, English- Nepali dictionary. All of these need to be packed individually in a bag marked with each child's name. Any letters from his sponsor needs to go into the bags as well. For Nepal, we need about 500 bags. Wow. We are grateful for our team.
